Since 2015, Google has been using its own internally-developed Tensor Processing Unit (TPU) chips to run machine-learning applications inside its data centers at speeds 15 to 30 times faster than traditional CPUs and GPUs.

My friend Michael Harris, a fellow mathematician and author, recently sent me his psychological profile as compiled by Apply Magic Sauce, an algorithm operated by the Cambridge University Psychometrics Centre. This is a cousin of an algorithm that profiles people via access to their Facebook accounts, some version of which was used last year by the software company Cambridge Analytica to help them sway U.S. voters.